The Girl Who Cried Wolf
by Last of the Lilac Wine
Summary: Vanessa Morgan has been at Alexandria from the very beginning. Alone and only nineteen, the world has made her suspicious, manipulative and smart. She doesn't trust Outsiders - a fact that isn't helped when she overhears the new group in the community, headed by Rick Grimes, planning to overtake her town.
1. Listen

**A/N **The Alexandria storyline gave me the idea for this, so I decided to give it a shot.

Story **Rated T **for swearing, mentions of rape and violence.

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**LISTEN**

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Spring came, looked for and sudden. The sun was spun out, bright, behind the clouds; it filtered in through the window softly, giving the video a sepia quality - catching the tiny particles of dust floating in the air.

A female voice floats in from somewhere off-screen. The words are heavy with significance. "He's gone."

The subject of the video, perched tensely on the brink of a pillowy chintz armchair, does not give an indication they have heard. In fact, they aren't looking at the camera - or the person behind it - they're looking out of the window, over the quiet streets to the thick walls guarding them.

"I'm sorry for what happened Vanessa," the woman behind the camera continues. There's a rustling sound, as if she's leaning forward in her chair. "Truly."

"Well it happened, okay?" The other woman - girl - says bluntly, suddenly twisting to look at the camera. She must be eighteen or nineteen; extraordinary, because her entire being seems to crackle with angry, violent electricity. Uncaring. Ruthless. It expands from her like a monster, rubbing its thousand ribs against the ground, spreading its shadowy wings.

"It did, but I could have prevented it...if I'd just listened to you."

"You did listen to me. You're very good at listening Deanna. You listened to me every single time I came to you -" the girl called Vanessa arches a single eyebrow, perfectly calculated to communicate the utmost disparagement. "You just didn't believe me."

"You're angry." This was too much a statement of fact to merit a reply or an elaboration, so they both fall silent. After a while Vanessa speaks again:

"How far out is he?" she demands, abruptly.

"Aaron and the others dropped him off with a days supply of food. No gun -a good few miles out from here."

"I meant specifically."

"He's not going to come back, Vanessa," said the woman behind the camera softly. "No one like him will ever get in here again."

"Unless Aaron lets them in again."

"Aaron feels terrible as it is. Don't make this harder for him by blaming him."

The sun goes behind a cloud. Peeks out again. A shadow slowly slides across the room.

"I do blame him," Vanessa says coldly and emphatically, like a preschool teacher explaining something to an uncomprehending student. "I blame you, Deanna. I blame this stupid town, because none of you idiots believed me."

"Vanessa -"

"HE WAS STARING YOU IN THE FACE! SMILING! FRIEDNLY! YOU ALL WERE ALL SO FUCKING CONVINCED BY HIM!" There's a sound of breaking glass as Vanessa stands abruptly, knocking something off a table. "FUCK YOU!"

"Vanessa-"

But she's already out of the room. The dust motes in the air are writhing and contorting from her sudden movement, like she's left a barely perceptible hurricane in her wake. The woman behind the camera sighs and there's a click of a sound recorder.

"My first formal interview with Vanessa Morgan after she was...raped by Tony Garcia. Tony is now being driven out of Alexandria as I speak by Aaron, Nicholas and my son, Aiden. We have left him a day's supply of food and no weapons. Aaron assures me he does not have the necessary skills to survive and will not return -" Here, the woman hesitates. The video captures her shadow crossing the far wall and then she appears in the footage briefly as she checks up and down the hallway before closing the door to the room carefully. She moves back behind the camera. "I have noted that Vanessa is...more volatile than even she used to be. As this video has illustrated she is an angry and hostile young woman...Note to self, re-listen to character profile constructed on Vanessa..." Again the woman called Deanna hesitates. The room on the video is now perfectly still, as if Vanessa had never been there at all. "I foresee problems ahead where Vanessa is concerned."


	2. Stronger

**A/N **Thank you for all your favourites, follows and reviews last chapter! I have been back and corrected Deanna's name in the previous chapter, so thank you for pointing that out to me. Let me know how this chapter is. Vanessa is very much the anti-hero, and it's difficult to find the right balance of sympathetic, relatable and bitchy.

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**STRONGER**

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_"Hello? Hello? Dad. It's me. Something's happened at school - they've shut it. We're all being sent home but the buses aren't running and I can't get home. I don't know what to do. The army are here. I'm pretty freaked out - I don't know what to do - just, please pick up the phone as soon as possible."_

I flicked over the next page of my book roughly.

Reading was my way of not thinking, of escaping from the outside world. I wasn't fully sure I read the words in front of me, even; every few seconds I would just - fllliicckk - to the next page with an impatient gesture of my wrist, invariably crumpling - even ripping - said page.

Though I wasn't focusing on my book, I didn't look up when there was a soft knock on my bedroom door. I stared resolutely down at the pages as Olivia stepped in, smiling.

"Treasure Island, huh?" she said, her fleshy arms crossed, her shoulders hunched up in an awkward don't-mind-little-old-me gesture, which is ironic, because she fills the expanse of the doorway. "That's one of your favourites, right?"

Olivia loves to pretend that she knows me because it unsettles her that she doesn't. She bakes a lot, and eats a lot of what she bakes. She's a do-gooder and a try-harder - kind of churchy - but obviously weak. Too earnest.

I nod once in reply. _Yes, yes Treasure Island is my favourite book, Olivia. Its my favourite book because it was my dead Dad's favourite book and I read it whenever I feel depressed that I'm now stuck with you and your tree-trunk thighs in this stupid house. Now if you could just go away, and shut the door behind you, that would be great_. Obviously, I don't say this out loud. Deanna's already had words with me about 'censoring' what I say, so I push the meanness down deep into the pit of my stomach where, no doubt, it will fester and expand until one quiet day it will explode out of me along with everything else I've compartmentalized and hidden.

When I imagine my mind, I imagine a long, dark corridor with lots of locked doors and monsters banging on the other side, just waiting to get out.

Luckily for Olivia, though, today is not that day. I look up and force a tight-lipped smile, which feels like my face is cracking in half, to make my words sound less blunt. "Can I help you?"

"Oh, well, I've just been over to the supply room because I needed some sugar for the cookies I was planning on making - you know, for the party Martha's throwing for -" Do I care that Martha's throwing a party, Olivia? No. Still talking? Really? Shut upppppp. Seriou - But then I stopped and listened.

"Wait, what?" I shut my book and threw it on my bedside table. I'd been sat on the window seat - my room was the converted attic and, perched here, I overlooked most of Alexandria - but as I spoke I jerked abruptly to my feet.

"-there's new people here, isn't that exciting?"

No, it wasn't, actually, because the last new person here had been Tony Garcia, and we all know how that one worked out.

I twitch like a spider, and Olivia notices because her face falls and she actually takes a step backwards.

"Oh, I'm so sorry Nessa, I wasn't thinking."

"Yeah A. That's because you have literally zero tact and B. It's Vanessa you fat cow. You do not get to call me that. Not ever." I grab my jacket from a hook on the wall and push past her.

There's a pantomime gasp of hurt. "Vanessa!"

Somehow, my toxic meanness always comes as a shock to Olivia. I think 'incidences' occur about once every week, which, for her goldfish mind, is long enough for her to forget and convince herself I'm a nice teenage kid, so that she's actually surprised when I come out with something like this again.

But I'm already down the stairs and out the front door, which closes behind me with a slam.

I actually wonder when people will stop giving me a free pass. I insult Olivia on a regular basis but its swept under the carpet because I've Been Through A Lot. I mock Martha and her stupid pasta machine to her face but everyone turns a blithe, blind eye to it because I'm Damaged. I could literally walk up and spit in someone's face here and they'd probably beam back at me. I wonder when they'll all stop caring and get angry. I want them to be angry at me.

But right now I'm cutting across all my perfect neighbours' perfect green-green grass lawns towards Deanna's house. There's bile in my throat and my teeth are gnashing together like some kind of animal's. Every muscle in my body is tensed and I keep well clear of the walls surrounding the community. I hate to get too close to them, as if they're sheets of paper that could be blown down with the slightest breath of wind. It's doesn't matter how many times Reg tells me that they're 'impenetrable' - I never get any closer. In my head, they're paper walls. They're liable to come down at any moment, mark my words.

I'm terrified I'll bump into the Outsiders before I get to Deanna, so by the time I reach her house - march in - (Aiden's yelling at me - "Hey! What the hell are you doing?") - and force my way into her office, my demand of "are you insane?!" is kind of ironic, because Deanna's not the one who's acting insane.

I'm breathless, my hair clings to my face like its wet - the Exorcism - but its really because its 82 degrees outside which means that its actually embarrassingly frizzy and static. (I feel the need to point out that see, I still have remainders of a soul of a teenage girl, I worry about my hair and everything!)

But that's not the most embarrassing, hideous part. What's worse is that Deanna isn't alone in her office for me to scream at. What's worse is that she's with someone else. What's worse is that person is a stranger to me - an outsider - and a man, with a beard like a caveman.

Instantly my mind's like white noise. Static, completely blank.

"What are you doing here?" Deanna asks, in her best wake up voice. The man has risen from his seat to stand, watching me as warily as I watch him.

The silence was deafening. Forget bile in the back of my throat, I was convinced I was going to vomit on Deanna's stupid presidential-candidate rug. This was actually happening. They'd actually let them in.

"Who is this?" My voice cracks. It sounds like I've lived in a desert for the past ten years. Somehow, though, the meanness in me becomes a gift - it makes me strong. Anger bubbles in my veins, potent, like a drug. I have the strength to look this man double my age and height in the eye. I even stride forward - because I'm angry god-dammit. I'm too angry to even be afraid. The feeling makes me reckless and giddy. I'm up in his face. "Who are you?" I snarl, my voice as cold and hard as stone. I feel unbreakable for the first time.

The beard covers his whole face, so I have to go off of eyes alone to read him. They're ice cool and utterly calm. He shifts slightly. Tilts his head like I'm some rare specimen he's never seen before. "Rick Grimes," he finally replies, in this deep, southern drawl. Its so civil I half expect him to offer to shake my hand or say pleased-to-meet-you. Tony Garcia would have.

"I haven't finished my interview with Rick," Deanna says to me, sharply. "Go and wait outside - now."

I look over my shoulder, and, sure enough, there is Deanna's video camera, pointing straight at me. I hate that thing with a passion - if there's one thing I regret more than anything, it's consenting to have those two interviews with her. The first when I arrived here was a 'character profile'. The second was after I was raped. She has those forever now; she can watch them and pick everything I do in them apart. When I imagine her watching those videos I imagine her in one of my lab experiments back at school, dissecting a frog. I see her sifting through the guts and the liver and the heart until she gets to the brain and tries to figure out all its secrets.

I look at her impassively and then move to do as she says, when the man - Rick - abruptly grabs my arm. Like a magic trick - like a cloak being pulled away to reveal what's really in the magic box - ta da! - the anger rushes out of me and I don't feel so brave anymore. In fact, I feel about five. My heart rate sky rockets and every muscle in my body tenses. Already, a scream is ready to go at the back of my throat.

"Who are you?" he asks me, his voice gravelly and low as he throws my question back at me. And just like that I remember that if trust is a two-way street than the reverse must also be true. Suspicion goes both ways and my mouth curves into a slight smirk when - even though I know I'm being marked out as a threat - I realize that I am capable of being a threat. Me, the perpetual victim. Me, the girl-woman everyone treats as if they are snowballed up in bubble-wrap.

Of course, I let it go to my head. I believe that the playing field is level. I have no idea who it is I'm up against.


	3. Poisonous

**A/N **Sorry this chapter is so late! I've had exams.

**POISONOUS**

Trying not to look as irrationally smug as I was feeling I walked back out of Deanna's office. As I left she gave me that stern schoolteacher look that said: _we'll-talk-later_, and I threw her a returning _can't-wait_, scowl. She wasn't my mother - she didn't control me. None of them did - not Olivia, not Aiden not Tony Garcia.

Tony wasn't here anymore. He couldn't touch me.

No, I had bigger problems to worry about now than Tony lurking outside those walls - namely the man called Rick who was currently sweet-talking Deanna into letting his group stay. My spine went cold as I remembered him: the beard that made him look half-wild, the dirt - the menacing, cold blue eyes.

When I left Deanna's my eyes instantly fell on the house Olivia and I shared, the one closest to the gate. In the basement we held the guns and the rations of food. I knew that protocol was to search newcomers and take their weapons, and I could visualise how Aaron and Eric would have done it. Beaming, smiling as if they'd seen instructional videos on how to courteously search new residents in the apocalypse. ('Residents', that's what Deanna always insisted we call them. Not outsiders.) I was tempted to check out the weapons hold - see what Aaron and Eric had taken from them, because I was kind of curious to see how they survived out there. I mean, they didn't have a basement full of ammunition like we do, did they? Did they have guns, or did they just use knives? What happened when they came across a herd? Out there...it was all a mystery to me.

I changed my mind, though, when I saw Aaron himself walking down West Street towards me.

He paused when he saw me standing motionless on top of the steps to Deanna's house, watching him. He was too far away still for me to see his face, but I knew the sight of my distinctive silhouette, motionless and rigid, would be enough to force him to hesitate. Again, it gave me a thrill of satisfaction that the roles were reversed - that me, a nineteen year old girl, could exert this kind of influence over a man. After a brief hesitation he walked up to me, the usually genial expression on his face pinched at the mouth.

"Hey there."

"Hi."

He climbed up to me and sat on the top step, canting one arm over his knees and twisted to look round me, peering into Deanna's house through the front window. "Rick in there?"

I hesitated and decided to sit down next to him - way too close - invading his personal space on purpose. My shoulders rubbed against his and I felt him twitch uncomfortably. "Oh, you mean...the new guy?" I faked.

He threw me a searching look which I returned, blankly. I had learnt over the past few months that I was good at defusing my emotions into a room, like an octopus and its ink - black tendrils just diffusing out of me like toxic gas. Aaron looked away first. "How many of them are there exactly, Aaron?" I asked. My voice still hadn't shaken its childlike lilt. Instead of my question coming out as a demand - authoritative and sharp, like Deanna could sound - my voice pitched high at the end like a kid's. _How come I can't touch the moon, Mommy? Read me a bed time story, Daddy. _I snapped my mouth shut instantly, my teeth audibly clacking together, and twisted my hands in my lap in frustration. I wasn't nearly as intimidating as I thought.

Aaron shrugged. "Twelve." Up his shoulders went. Down. _No big deal_. No biggie.

My hands clenched a little tighter. "How long were you tracking them for?"

"Maybe a week."

I know how Aaron works because the only two times I have been outside these walls were with him and Eric. After...Tony Deanna thought I would be useful to them; after all, I had been the only one to see the bastard Tony was under that thick veneer of respectable do-gooder. Turns out, though, I'm not actually that great at people-reading, just extremely paranoid. If you yell that someone's a psychotic murderer every time, one of those times you're going to be right.

"What were they like?" I asked, suddenly becoming intently fascinated by my nails. He knew what I meant.

"Starving. Half dead - but resourceful and smart. Kinda paranoid." He paused, and I filled the silence for him in my head _\- a lot like you, actually. _I peeked at Aaron out of the corner of my eye, watching as he gathered enough conviction to look turn and look at my fully. His hands were spread out, palms facing skyward as if seeking Godly atonement. "They'll be good for us, Vanessa. I know it. I have a good feeling about this."

Something clots in my stomach, like a pre-warning before a cardiac arrest.

"Would it be too repetitive if I said this is a bad idea?" I snarked. "I feel like people are getting bored of it."

He shook his head, looking out over Alexandria. When he spoke, his voice came out pained. "Vanessa..."

"I just want you to know," - I rose to give myself the advantage of height and casually strolled down the steps. At the bottom I turned and faced Aaron, crossing my arms and tapping one finger against my bicep patiently. "Anything that goes wrong...It's on you." I was proud of myself that I managed to keep my voice light and cavalier, like I'd seen old-school villains do on movies. I figured it would be way more unsettling. I wagged my finger at him. "Don't make me say I told you so, Aaron."

"You won't have to. They're good people."

I ignored his conviction and left him sat there, making my way to my garden.

It was the community garden, technically, but Deanna had given me free reign of it as a way of making me useful. They'd spent ages trying to come up with a realistic occupations for me; at nineteen I was too old to be in school, too damaged to be a fighter, too abrasive to be involved in any kind of group work. The garden was a great compromise, apparently, because it meant I had some kind of therapeutic activity to do and kept me the hell away from people and people the hell away from me. For my benefit or theirs...Deanna never really specified.

The garden was idyllic; several allotments sloping gently down to the banks of the pond that lay at Alexandra's heart. A large willow tree overshadowed the shed where I kept my equipment, leaving the rest of the plants exposed to the hot Georgian sun. Eric had rigged a pump for me from the pond to provide natural irrigation for the plants so they didn't completely frazzle in the sunlight. I had vegetables and a couple of medicinal herbs growing (Pete somehow took that as a personal affront to his PhD, but I still grow them anyway, just to piss him off). The theory for the garden is that Alexandria is supposed to be self-sustaining, but the truth is we don't really need it - Aiden and the others manage to get all we need from runs: this is really just for show.

I open the shed. Nothing is ever locked here. Olivia doesn't even lock our front door during the day. I make a mental note to make her start, with Rick's group here, and to double-check the locks on the weaponry bin and food.

In the shed I put on my gardening gloves and grab a bucket and then spend the next hour or so weeding. When I'm finished I check on the rest of the plants in the garden. People don't know a lot about plants - they'd probably be surprised to know that even the most basic stuff, like thyme, is a strong antiseptic or that the bulb of a daffodil is so poisonous it could kill you.

I mean, I didn't know any of this either - but Deanna has a library full of books on crap like this.

I collect some of the herbs into a bag when I'm done and leave - smirking at Pete when he glares at me as I pass him on the street. Maybe he's actually worried I'll out him as doctor for this place with my hippy herbal remedies. Hah, yeah right. Like I'd do anything voluntarily to help anyone else, ever.

I smile a little to myself as if I've just made some great joke, but stop when I realize I must look like a sociopath. Also, I'm not really used to smiling - my cheek muscles are out of practice.

I also stop in my tracks when I arrive at my and Olivia's house and stare in disbelief.

Take a guess who moved in right next door - I dare you.

**A/N **Please leave a review. Again, sorry for the wait for this chapter. If anyone has any ideas for the direction of this story, I'd love to here them. I mean, I've got a rough idea of a plot, but it's nice to hear what my readers want to see.


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